Ten ex-Samsung employees arrested for leaking 10nm-class memory tech to China

After five years of research and an investment of KRW 1.6 trillion, in February 2016, Samsung started the mass production of 10-nanometer-class DRAM, the first company in the world to achieve this milestone. Unfortunately, the brand's technology for manufacturing these DRAM chips, which was classified as a national core technology and a trade secret, was stolen. 

It enabled a Chinese firm, ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT), to make 10nm-class DRAM chips from 2023, costing the South Korean tech giant around 5 trillion won and the South Korean nation tens of trillions of won. In 2024, Korean law agencies started an investigation into the matter, and now they have caught the culprits and charged them with the crime.

According to a report from Korea JoongAng Daily, on Tuesday, Seoul Central District Prosecutors’ Office said that it had indicted ten individuals violating the Unfair Competition Prevention and Trade Secret Protection Act and the Act on Prevention of Divulgence and Protection of Industrial Technology. Five people, including former Samsung employees, were indicted with detention, and the other five, including members of CXMT’s development team, were indicted without detention.

CXMT was established in 2016, with investments from local governments and semiconductor design firms. Shortly after it, the Chinese firm recruited a former Samsung Electronics department head to lead its development. In September, the department head and a few other people, including a former Samsung researcher, obtained Samsung’s 18nm DRAM process technology through another former Samsung employee at CXMT. It was then unlawfully used in CXMT's DRAM development. 

The former Samsung employee copied hundreds of steps of 10nm-class DRAM technology by hand before transferring it to CXMT. To obtain the technology, the former Samsung department head and others had set up a shell company, which frequently changed offices, and even created their own language to use as a code in case of potential travel bans or arrests. 

Later, the former Samsung employee transferred the technology to the former Samsung department head and their members. The former Samsung department head and other members then transferred the technology to another of CXMT’s development teams, which then modified the technology to suit Chinese manufacturing equipment, between 2018 and 2023, to develop DRAM chips.

Commenting on the matter, prosecutors said, “Considering the scale of the domestic semiconductor industry — which accounts for 20.8 percent of total exports — the damage to the national economy is expected to reach at least tens of trillions of won. Through a direct investigation, we uncovered and punished not only the technology leaks committed domestically but also […] the development-related crimes carried out in China. We will continue to respond strictly to overseas illegal technology leaks that threaten the national economy and technological security.”